This post here is for every African American that has every told me that they weren't African. "My ancestors are from Africa," they'd say, "but I am not." In my dissertation, I wrote about proto-nationalism which is a philosophy that says a person shows patriotism to their land of origin or their blood-line. African Americans should know that proto-nationalist movements birthed the lifestyle that African Americans relish in the present day. Proto-nationalism was the first order of business in order to develop the society that we live in today.
Anyway, I am posting (the rough copy of) my dissertation below to enlighten people. African Americans have fully embraced the American culture and this is GREAT!! African ancestors fought very hard to achieve equality. Though, African Americans have denounced African heritage at the expense of embracing the American culture as their first culture.
Dissertation
Recently, I travelled to Ghana, West Africa and upon my return, my friends and family asked about my trip. I told them,
“Ghana feels just like home. I think everybody should travel back to their roots.”
The concept of Africa being “home” is not a common or accepted perception of Africa among African Americans. Most of them do no identify with Africa and neither do they care to.
“My ancestors are African,” they’d say, “but I am not.”
It is my opinion that Africans with western educations and Eurocentric ideologies, cultural values, and traditions, are a displaced and confused people that refuse to embrace African history as part of black heritage in America. African Americans renounce proto-nationalist ideologies without understanding how leaders of the movement helped to shape the world and provide the comfort African Americans are afforded today.
Distance, years of separation, and alienation from African culture and ways of life have caused African-Americans to deny their heritage. Some people that oppose Black Nationalism believe that the philosophy creates racial segregation. They will not admit to the fact that Black Nationalism is the back bone of social, political, and cultural justices that African Americans relish in modern day America. The same African Americans that renounce proto-nationalism are the same African Americans benefiting from privileges born out of proto-nationalist movements.
Proto-nationalism is an ideology that means one owes patriotism not to the government of the state that he physically resides in, but rather to the tribe, race or sect with which he shares an ancestral origin (Kanter, 2010). There are different indigenous nationalist philosophies, but the principles of the various forms of Black Nationalism are unity, self-determination, and independence from European dominance.
A strong and turbulent era of proto-natiolsism in the African American community was in the 1960s and 70s. The visionary W.E.B. Du Bois spearheaded Pan-Africanism and organized the 5th Pan-African Conference. Pan-Africanism is a socio-political movement that seeks to unify native Africans and those of African heritage into a global African community, (Itibari M. Zulu, 2010). Du Bois called for black people to build on the strength of their heritage. In 1909, he founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). African Americans were outraged at the social injustice in America. The infamous Race Riot of 1908 highlighted the urgent need for an effective civil rights organization in the United States.
Proto-nationalism in the African American community gave birth to the Civil Rights Movement, The Black Power Movement, and all things that were for the advancement and equality for blacks living in America. The Civil Rights and Black Power Movement predicated racial pride and sought to create political and cultural institutions to nurture and promote black interests. Following the dark cloud of slavery and colonialism in Africa, African leaders from all over the world realized that it was imperative for all Africans to unite. African Americans learned how to take pride in their heritage and culture because of Black Nationalist movements in the United States. African Americans also learned about their descendants’ accomplishments, gifts, and talents. Proto-nationalism is a very important ideology because you have to know where you are from in order to know where you’re headed.
Culture and society in the United States is a blend distinct cultures from other nations around the world. American culture is one that is a blend of different cultures and values. American nationalism is a political or social philosophy in which the welfare of the nation-state as an entity is considered paramount. Nationalism is basically a collective state of mind or consciousness in which people believe their primary duty and loyalty is to the nation-state (K. N. BRUTENTS, 2010). Nationalism is the bond that holds nations together; while Black Nationalism is the movement that unified African-Americans paving the way for the success and equality that blacks have attained. Nationalism is a sentiment based on common cultural characteristics that binds a society and often produces a policy of national independence or separatism. For example, people express nationalism by belonging to a large group of people that they share things in common with.
The Back to Africa movement is another example of proto-nationalism in our history, but it was not widely accepted. During the 18th and 19th century, some African Americans believed that they would never be truly equal to the superior race in America. They migrated to other lands in search of freedom and equality to establish a separate, self-governing society in other parts of the world such as the Caribbean, Canada, and Africa. Leaders of Black Nationalism believed that African Americans had very little chances of attaining independence in the United States.
A common theme in African Nationalism was the repatriation of slaves to Liberia and Sierra Leone. An organization was established, The American Colonization Society (ACS), in 1816 by Robert Finley as an attempt to satisfy groups of white Americans that felt African Americans would not be able to assimilate into white society. They feared the freed slaves and wanted them sent back to Africa. African Americans began their return to Africa through the ACS and the society aided by providing transportation and settlement. Henry Clay, a long-time supporter of colonization named it as Gods work stating that “there is a moral fitness in the idea of returning to Africa her children, whose ancestors have been torn from her by the ruthless hand of fraud and violence. Transplanted to a foreign land, they will carry back to their native soil the rich fruits of religion, civilization, law and liberty. May it not be one of the great designs of the Ruler of the universe (whose ways are often inscrutable by short-sighted mortals), thus to transform an original crime, into a signal blessing to that most unfortunate portion of the globe?”
The Back to Africa Movement was thwarted when early black leaders rejected the plan. They felt that they were American; being born on American soil. Their forefathers fought and shed blood for American freedom. They felt no connection to Africa and sought none.
Marcus Garvey, an African nationalist leader, was an advocate of ACS and wanted to see black people move back to Africa. Garvey felt that African American’s quest for social equality was a delusion and that blacks would always be a permanent minority who could never assimilate because white Americans would never let them. Garvey’s version of Black Nationalism argued that African Americans were fated to be a permanent minority who could never assimilate because white Americans would never let them, (Harris, 1972). Therefore, in order for African Americans to advance their economic, political, and social interests should relocate.
Followers of Marcus Garvey’s version of Black Nationalism were from the lower end of the economic scale. They were Southerners that had travelled North during the Great Migration, servicemen returning from the World War I, and West Indians. The blacks that took up the ACS’s offer to remove to Africa were recently freed slaves. Garvey’s philosophy was that “for man to know himself is for him to feel that for him there is no human master. For him nature is his servant and whatsoever he wills in Nature, that shall be his reward,” (Garvey, 2005). Garvey believed that when a man failed to grasp authority, he was like the animals.
African Americans denounced the ACS’s scheme as an "outrage having no other object in view than the slaveholding interests of the country.” African Americans that were against the ACS recognized the inequality they faced in the United States, but still proclaimed American soil as home. Peter Williams, and Episcopal priest from New York of African descent asserted that black people are “natives of this country and ask only to be treated as well as foreigners and seek to only share equal privileges with those who come from distant lands, to enjoy the fruits of our labor. Let these modest requests be granted, and we need not to go to Africa or anywhere else to be improved and happy," (Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture).
Proto-nationalism has helped African Americans rediscover their unique cultural identity. The West is, largely, nationalist and proto-nationalism creates a competing patriotism. Many people are ignorant to the fact that Black Nationalism shaped the world that we live in today. When I hear them say “I’m not African,” shows their ignorance. Proto-nationalism was especially important in the black community because of the equality that movements born from in the Civil Rights era.
John Henry Clarke stated that “No people are really free people are really free until they become the instrument of their own liberation. Freedom is not legacy that is bequeathed from one generation to another. Each generation must take and maintain its freedom with its own hands,” (Clarke, 1961).
The power of Black Nationalism in America is diminishing. This is due to the fact that African Americans are more content, (than their ancestors were), with their social, political, and economic conditions in America. The cultural heritage of Africa is relative to westernized and non-westernized Africans. Black nationalism is vitally important in American society because it fuels proto-nationalist’s ambitions, pride, and self-esteem.
African Americans have more than one history. We have African history and American history and both stories are two-sided. African Americans celebrate Independence Day, but July 4th did not liberate the slaves. Every year, African Americans should celebrate January 1st and July 4th. January 1st, 1863 is the day that President Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery and freed 3.1 million slaves. The Emancipation Proclamation is important to African Americans because slaves weren’t freed when white America was free from colonial rule. Rather, African Americans became free almost 100 years later by way of an executive order. How can black Americans celebrate Independence Day when blacks were not free or independent? Both Independence Day and the Emancipation Proclamation will be noteworthy in African American history and should be equally weighted and taught in black society.
The Declaration of Independence states that “All men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” (Hancock, 1776).
These words did not apply to slaves in any way. The United States being freed from England meant nothing for African Americans because the Revolutionary veterans didn't prohibit the buying and selling of slaves in the written constitution, (Austin, 2011). July 4th is a contradiction; white America celebrated freedom while black people were denied their freedom.
Black Americans worked to increase the wealth of our nation, but reaping the benefits of that wealth was slow to come. Black nationalist movements fought for equality and justice in the African American community- not Independence Day. It took another hundred years and a Civil War before slavery was completely abolished in the United States. The 13th amendment to the United States Constitution outlawed slavery, the 14th Amendment gave African Americans citizenship, and the 15th Amendment gave them the right to vote.
John L. O’Sullivan in The Great Nation of Futurity article stated, “The American people having derived their origin from many other nations and this fact demonstrates at once our disconnected position as regards any other nation,” (The United States Democratic Review, 1839). US national birth marked a new point in history, the formation and progress of an untried political system separated the United States from British colonial powers. The article goes on to say that principle upon which a nation is organized fixes its destiny, and that equality is perfect and universal. It presides in all the operations of the physical world, and it is also the conscious law of the soul. The United States government was developed with democratic principles; however, the new government did not afford slaves the same rights as white Americans until revisions were made to the US Constitution. This was true and the reason why African Americans continued to fight for equality in the land in which they were born.
Dr. Martin Luther King’s, a African nationalist leader, birthday was made a holiday in the United States because he fought for racial equality and the American dream. Pan-Africanism is a movement started in the 1900s that sought to secure equal rights, self-government, independence, and unity for all African people. It encouraged self-awareness by encouraging African people to study all aspects of their heritage. African nationalist figures like, Kwame Nkrumah, fought for independence in Ghana, West Africa.
The roots of Pan-Africanism can be traced back to the 18th century when Africans in the West expressed their discontent with slavery, colonialism, and white supremacy. American officials began to realize that US Foreign Policy would be affected by the dissatisfaction of African Americans. Other American officials drafted adverse conclusions determining that Black Nationalism was only interested in African American affairs not showing interest in issues of the United States as a whole. These American officials failed to realize that the issues in the United States were the inequality and injustice-related issues that African Americans were experiencing. The United States never had an official policy based on granting African Americans complete citizenship or a policy based on eliminating colonialism in Africa. Instead, African nationalism sought to correct these issues as much as possible.
All African life is now going through a period of transition and modernization. African societies all around the globe are takings steps toward preserving African traditions. On my journey back to Africa, I thought that I would learn a lot about my origin; my ancestors’ traditions, religions, and cultural values. Instead, I learned that a lot of African- cultural practices in the mother land were suppressed and forbidden to be practiced because colonial rulers promoted European supremacy on the continent. A lot of history in Africa is lost.
In conclusion, Black Nationalist movements in the United States afforded African Americans the free and equal society that we live in today. African Americans are so distant from Africa because they were alienated from African culture. Eurocentric ideologies perpetuate negative thoughts of Africa. Black nationalist movements birthed the Civil Rights Movement, the NAACP, and Pan-Africanism, (just to name a few).
